I woke
up this morning with the idea that my column today would be a triumph of
brilliance, and intellect, and wit, and you would all laugh so hard that you
would commit the ultimate act of Internet respect: you'd share it on Facebook,
right below a Buzzfeed post filled with animal GIFs. But then I saw that video where Travis got
kidnapped by Jeff Gordon, and I realized nothing I say or do can top that. So instead I'm going to talk about parking
sensors.

Now,
before I get started, I want to mention that this column started off as a list
of grievances with my Range Rover. My
theory was that someone needed to air
these grievances, and it couldn't be the kind of person who typically drives a
Range Rover, because they are often members of the dreaded "one percent." These days, whenever a one-percenter
complains, it's looked upon as a first-world
problem, and they're told to go back to their private jets. It's a shame,
really: the one percent don't seem to have much of a voice anymore, unless you
count Congress.

So I
went outside and I climbed in my Range Rover, where I encountered two of my
oldest friends: the check engine light and the ABS light. (They've been loyal to me, on and off, since
I got my first Range Rover two years ago.)
And that's when it hit me: I don't have
any grievances with the Range Rover.
It's perfect in every way.

But I
thought really hard, and I came up
with one issue that affects not only my Range Rover, but just about every other
modern car: the parking sensors.

Advertisement

For
those of you who don't have parking sensors on your vehicle, allow me to
explain. The way it works is, you go
into the car dealer and you choose the safest vehicle you can possibly find;
one that offers airbags, and traction control, and cameras, and automatic
braking, and all sorts of other crap that we were easily able to live without
until we discovered it existed.

This
makes you happy. You've done it: you've
found The Safest Car In The World. You
agree. Your wife agrees. The salesman agrees. Nothing
could possibly be safer, except maybe living out your days in an
underground bunker. And even then, there
could be a devastating earthquake. An
earthquake won't get you in your new car.
There's a Richter Scale in the infotainment system.

But
then you're informed, as you're signing the paperwork, of something important:
your new car – you know, The Safest Car In The World – has dangerous blind
spots, and you really should do something about it. So you tick the "parking sensors" option box,
which adds something like $500, or maybe $1,000 to the price of your new car. At Porsche, maybe it's $1,500, because the button
is wrapped in carbon fiber.

Advertisement

So your
car arrives a few weeks later, and it turns out the parking sensors don't just
help you park: they're also placed on the front and rear bumper as obviously as
possible, so as to resemble the rivets on a World War II-era airplane. "Nice
rivets, Jim!" people say, in your office parking lot. "Going
for the retro look there? HAHAHAHA!" This angers you deeply. "My name isn't Jim," you say.
"It's Doug."

Anyway:
now that we've covered what parking sensors are, I think it's time to get to
the subject of what they do.

Once
again, this segment is for people who don't have parking sensors. If that's you, let me just sum up the feature
with a line from Notorious B.I.G., who was so large that he probably had his
own parking sensors. The line is: "mo money, mo problems."

Advertisement

Here's
what I mean. Correct me if I'm wrong, you
parking-sensorless masses, but this is approximately how it goes when you're
trying to park your car:

1. You look around.2. You park.

It's
that easy, right? But once you have parking sensors, life is never that
simple again. Instead, the process goes something like this:

1. You look around.2. You ease into the spot.3. BEEP BEEP BEEP BEEP BEEP.4. You slow down and look around again,
concerned that you're about to hit something.5. You realize that you're not, so you keep
going.6. BEEEEP BEEEP BEEP!!!! BEEP!!!
BEEP FOR GOD'S SAKE!!!! BEEEP!!!
YOU SON OF A–7. You stop again. What
the hell am I about to hit?!8. You continue moving forward.9. BEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEP!!!!10. At this point, the parking sensors dial the
police, because you're endangering your passengers and also whatever you're
about to hit. Probably schoolchildren,
you careless asshole.11. You get out so you can see just what has the
parking sensors so bothered.12. It's a shrub.

Advertisement

This is
the main problem with parking sensors, namely that they cannot tell the
difference between something you shouldn't
hit, like a wall, and something you wouldn't mind hitting, like people who brag about their Android phones.

To
illustrate this issue more clearly, allow me to provide you with a personal
example. Over the last few weeks, my
hometown of Atlanta has been hit with a couple of ice storms. You may have heard about them, because they
shut down everything and threw the whole city into a state of panic. I don't know that personally, because I was
sitting inside, wearing sweat pants, and watching TV. But I heard it was bad out there.

Anyway:
during these storms, my entire vehicle was coated with ice. The result is that when I went to drive it,
the sensors were beeping and beeping as if the world was about to end, simply
because they thought I was about to hit the
icethat had accumulated on my
bumper. Eventually, I had to reach
down there and push the button to turn them off, which is really a lot of work
for a tremendously busy writer who already took the trouble of getting dressed
that day.

Advertisement

So I
propose that we establish some sort of federal law that says carmakers can only
use parking sensors if the sensors can tell the difference between, say, a wall
and a shrub. Of course, I can't
propose this law. I'll need someone with
clout; someone with money; someone with real pull. Some member of the one percent. I'll look around the waiting room at the Land
Rover dealership.

@DougDeMuro is
the author of Plays With Cars.
He owned an E63 AMG wagon and once tried to evade police at the Tail of the
Dragon using a pontoon boat. (It didn't work.) He worked as a manager for
Porsche Cars North America before quitting to become a writer, largely because
it meant he no longer had to wear pants. Also, he wrote this entire bio himself
in the third person.